SANTA MONICA, CA

THE EDITION OF SANTA MONICA, CA — 1980

Being a resort for both skateboarding and basketball, Santa Monica has a reputation for changing the music and style in 80’s. For the first time, people wore high-top sneakers; one could find prototypes in the stores as what real professional skateboarders and basketball players wore in a game. Similarly, those skateboarders, basketball players began to wear high-top shoes as well and even more, they would place a pad on a high-top basketball shoe in oder to cover laces thus making it more freewheeling during the sport. This seemingly insignificant change at that time, however, completely changes the sneaker history.

Skateboarders borrowed the hight-top idea from canvas basketball shoes with the purpose to protect ankles and to keep balance. This explains its elastic material on the top and why it takes effort to try on shoes at first. The idea is to protect ankles.